


Pupal

by Eyrdamun



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Non-Sexual Bondage, Violence, post 11/21
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-01
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-09 20:38:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11676654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eyrdamun/pseuds/Eyrdamun
Summary: Akira doesn't trade anything. And even so, the handcuffs are replaced by straps and ropes, the inspectors by a detective and the torture with a dance.





	Pupal

Nijima Sae took Akira’s phone.

Akechi Goro left his own at his desk and took Akira’s from Nijima’s hands.

Now, a guard lies rasping for breath on the floor, red bleeding out and reaching towards Akira’s feet like a sacrifice and Akechi adjusts his gloves.

Akira wants to say something, but his tongue feels swollen and heavy, the drugs hazing his mind. There’s an itch where they had injected them in his bloodstream and his fingers twitch. The rest of his muscles remain still, eyes wide and pupils blown from the high that didn’t blind him from the severity of the situation.

The traitor points the gun to his face, studying the image it paints and then looks down at his feet, nodding to himself. Akira closes his eyes, tries not to worry about the others he is leaving behind, about the friends he failed to protect.

He circles the table, presses a gloved hand to Akira’s cheeks and examines.

“They did quite the number.“

Blearily, Akira opens his eyes. His vision swims, there’s an extra layer of moisture to them and there are inhibitors in his system.

“What a bunch of imbeciles you all are.“

He is roughly pulled up by the arm, but falls almost immediately as Akechi rises him to his feet. The leg the ‘inspector‘ had stepped on giving out under his weight and a few stray tears slip. If his throat hadn’t been so hoarse and dry, he would have cried out.

Akechi sighs, a grimace of disgust twisting his face and he lifts him up in his arms. Akira is confused at how gently he is laid on the floor and, in his stupor, can only watch as Akechi places the guard’s body on the chair he had previously been sitting on.

From his angle on the floor, he can’t see what Akechi does as he leans over the table- only that he stands where he first pointed the gun at his forehead and shoots.

The guard is really a sacrifice, Akechi a priest, and Akira doesn't know quite where he is supposed to fit.

“This is where your justice led you,“ The traitor whistles, hiding the silencer in his blazer and rearranging his gloves. “ Lamb left for slaughter with a basement for a tomb and at the mercy of a murderer.“

He throws the guard back to his previous spot on the ground, turning him on his stomach with a kick. When he turns, there’s no plastic smile, no glint in his eye. Only a slight upward pull of the corner of his lips as he stares at his shadows.

“I hate it.“

Their eyes meet.

“You would have to be pried away from me if I were facing my demise, am I correct?“ Akechi walks towards him leisurely. He pulls out Akira’s phone, kneels before him and takes his hand. “What a good Samaritan.“

Using Akira’s finger, he opens the MetaNav, and the distortion turns everything black.

 

* * *

 

The bed he wakes up on is soft, the pillows fluffy and it smells too clean for the room to be a dust covered attic atop a coffee shop. There’s no sunlight, he figures it’s night.

His wounds don’t ache anymore, or they do and their pain is but a distant pulse along the flesh. Akira still can’t move, he is too drained and bones heavy as if molded out of iron. He is a statue, he feels like a corpse.

Akira goes back to sleep like the dead, and maybe tomorrow he’ll be able to walk.

 

* * *

 

He wakes to the flipping of paper, to the clinging of a mug and to a grunt.

“I know you’re awake.“

Akira pins Akechi with grey clouds for a stare.

“I’m fond of rain,“ Akechi approaches him, and Akira has enough presence of mind to realize whose bed he is lying on. Just as he is about to sit up, Akechi does it for him and places the pillow on his back. “It’s soothing.“

“Cleansing,“ Akira rasps out. He doesn’t know why, he is still too tired to move, but Akechi spared him, so he can, at the very least, give him this much.

Akechi laughs, and there’s a strange guilty look shining in his eyes that he doesn’t bother to hide. “You always understand.“

He turns around, and Akira tries to follow. Instead, he falls forward and that’s when he notices his ankles are tied together, and so are his wrists. Akechi shoots him a glance over the shoulder and huffs.

“You... actually expected me to just let you go.“

Akira looks up to Akechi and uses the remaining strength he finds to sit up.

“Ah,“ Akechi tilts his head to the side and brushes his fringe out of his eyes. “So you hoped I would.“

He doesn’t get an answer nor does he hope for one. Akechi just leaves and brings back a glass of water with him, raises it to Akira’s lip with one hand, the other buried in the back of his head. It nestles itself there, pulls him back and it hurts a bit, it feels sharper than his injuries from-

He doesn’t know how long it has been, so he focuses on quenching his thirst first.

Akechi stares at him with half-lidded eyes, and, that too, he doesn’t understand. Akechi doesn’t seem like he wants to explain, wants to venture to what he means and wishes as his fingers twirl in dark curls.

Maybe it means nothing.

“It won’t be forever,“ the older boy whispers. “Just until I finish what I started.“

“And what about what _I_ started?“ Akira had finished his glass and Akechi hums as he places it on the bedside table.

“Well, isn’t it obvious?“

Akira is afraid to know.

He only stares. With a shrug of his shoulders, Akechi continues, “I ended that for you.“

Akechi makes him lie down again, and Akira knows he can’t fight him right now. Not when he is still too sore, not when he doesn’t know what’s going on.

“I’ll go get something to eat,“ Akechi promises with a smile and a wink befitting of a prince. “So, please do just stay here and rest.“

He smiles as if on a gameshow, as if auditioning for the part of a knight in shining armour, and Akira wonders why. He falls into a restless sleep. In his dream, the three investigators welcome him again with closed hands and burning needles clenched in their palms.

Akechi shakes him awake, who knows how long after, with convenience store food for two in a plastic bag.

There’s a new piece of rope tying his legs together now. It snakes up his calves and knots like an ouroboros- he wouldn’t know how to untie it. Either way, his upper arms are strapped to his chest now. There’s still enough room for him to bend his elbows and eat by himself, but his tied wrist don’t permit him to use two utensils.

At least Akechi had enough decency to get him steamed buns.

He also has the nerve to actually let him explore how much he can move, actively taunting him with an expression that reads he won’t leave. “I had to strengthen the bindings,“ he takes out his own food and flops the bag with the other half of the share on Akira’s lap. “The Metaverse healing was more effective than I expected.“

Akira tries not to show that he is unsettled.

“That’s good to know.“

He eats. There’s a bug in his phone, Futaba will find him soon enough. He can’t count the days though, there’s no window in the room.

 

* * *

 

“I like rain, but I’m only fond of storms when I’m not stuck in them.“

Akira keeps staring at Akechi, wriggling his toes and playing with the chain of the handcuffs that have his arms locked above his head on the bed’s headboard. The detective makes a show of being absorbed in his book, but they both know where his mind is wandering.

“Not my fault, you don’t give me anything to do.“

“You’re quite relaxed for someone in your position.“

They both know he isn’t. Akira blinks, Akechi smiles more honestly than he has in a long time.

“If I make too many sudden payments, it will be suspicious, Kurusu-kun.“

Akira snorts and pulls at the metal biting into his wrists. It hurts, but it’s the only control on the situation he has at the moment. The only control over Akechi he can exert because he always takes extra care dressing up his wounds.

“You talk as if you aren’t suspected already.“

Akechi closes his book, and presses his left pointer finger to his lips in thought.

"I broke your phone and left it in Mementos after I picked mine from the office," Akechi confesses as if he were one step ahead of the thief. So Futaba won't come. Neither will the others- he hopes they don't miss him too much.

"Are you implying that we are your only enemies?" He thinks his wrist is bleeding. He knows it is when Akechi stands up and slides a white handkerchief as an excuse for a band-aid between the metal and his skin.

What a sorry excuse for a pretend prince.

There's a beat of silence, there's the mocking of something unsaid. Akechi simply frowns, his voice a whisper. "I’ll keep your words in mind."

 

* * *

 

He gets healthier day by day. The bindings on his limbs get heavier and thicker day by day too.

“At this point I should give you an hour warning before I need to go to the bathroom.“

“Oh, you’re right. I’ll install an urinary catheter on you.“

“What a gentleman, always looking out for his damsel in distress.“

The leathers binding Akira’s limbs are snug, and he is grateful that Akechi lets him exercise a bit in Mementos after casting Forget on him so he can’t summon his personae- no, really, he is thankful for the chance to deny his muscles atrophy, for the chance to pace like a caged animal.

It’s not as if his dreams-nightmares, he corrects himself- are any better, but the leather that envelops his limbs feels like a mother’s embrace. Akira briefly wonders if Akechi did it on purpose, if he really became that tired of being woken up by Akira screaming or sobbing. He doesn’t ask. He is tired of it too.

Akira doesn’t ask how much longer until Akechi “finishes what he started“. He learned quickly that he wouldn’t get any answers the first time when instead of a date, all he got was a lecture on patience being a virtue.

As if either of them were paragons of morality.

Akira scoffs, Akechi reaches out to but stops his hand inches away from the thief’s forehead. Black curls are impairing his sight, and he blows them away. His breath caresses Akechi’s fingertips, and he has the galls to actually shiver as if any of that meant anything.

He retracts his hand with difficulty, Akira can’t fathom why. He can’t grasp, he can’t see, he can’t comprehend, and there’s a chorus of _why_ gripping and shaking at the leather binds. He feels like puking, but all he can retch is words. For all his faults, Akechi had been feeding him healthily enough.

“Why didn’t you kill me?“

“Why did I have to kill you?“

Akechi’s tone is melancholic, and Akira feels gastric acid burning past his stomach lining, attacking his bones, his flesh, yet leaving the bindings intact.

“I don’t know, you tell me.“

The detective doesn’t reply and the thief is tempted to spit at his feet.

 

* * *

 

One day, Akira makes an attempt. Not to escape, he is aware he won’t be able to do so alone.

“Let me in.“

Akechi studies his expression, his words, his stillness and pliancy under the leather holding him down.

“Let me in,“ he says again and Akechi shakes his head.

“Then let me out.“

Akechi’s hands are gloveless and folded on his lap, he brought a chair to the room and sits across the bed. He doesn’t speak but his fingers clench against each other and his knuckles turn white like hollies.

Between an imprisoned thief and a plastic knight, there’s nothing holy.

“Sing me to sleep and kiss me goodnight then.“

“Don’t.“

As asked, he doesn’t press. Akira is cocooned in chains, and lies.

 

* * *

 

The place smells more lived in.

That’s one of the things Akira notices. The sheets feel less like the ones of a model home, they have become worn with usage. The plates aren’t as pristine. Akira wonders if Akechi even lived in this place before he was to be caged in it.

He thinks he didn’t.

He is getting used to this place but doesn’t want to think of it as a home, he has one already. He can’t go back to it yet, and the knowledge only slightly withers him, Akira’s skin is unbecoming of the living. But he knows Akechi has been feeding him vitamin supplements, so he doesn’t worry if it looks paper thin in its whiteness. He maybe looks more like the phantom thief he is supposed to be. In the eyes of society, he is a dead man but his coffin is four walls and the pressure of leather straps.

He goes back to sleep.

Akira dreams he is a stray cat, empty alleys and the cover of the night.

 

* * *

 

“Tomorrow,“ Akechi tells him.

“Tomorrow,” Akira repeats.

The detective undoes the binds that tie him to the bed, but leaves the ones ensnaring his limbs into each other.

“I’ll leave the door open,“ Akechi says, “Tomorrow.“

Akira’s eyes widen and his lips part. Words don’t come out, and he licks his lips to stall for time to process it. In the end, he shakes his head.

“Leave the door closed.“

Akechi looms over him, hand caressing Akira’s cheek as he leans down. They don’t kiss, instead it’s their breaths that mingle and that stroke flesh. He smiles and it’s sad, longing, but iron-willed.

“Your eyes are the colour of a rainy day,” Akechi mumbles to himself. “And yet, they oddly remind me of gunpowder as well.”

Only then, he moves, and brushes his lips on the spot where a bullet would have been buried in Akira’s skull.

The next day, the door is open. There’s a knife on the kitchen floor sharp enough to pierce the leather that Akira wields with awkwardness as he frees himself of his induced pupal stage. He passes by a couch, a blanket thrown over its back and the imprint of the ghost of a body’s sleeping form weights the cushions- Akira only notices it due to the sunrise illuminating the room from the window directly across the couch. He returns to the four walls he had known throughout his whole captivity as he massages his wrists.

On the bed side table is a phone.

“What a good Samaritan,” Akira echoes.

He picks it up and dials.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! As always please feel free to point out mistakes. Written for a the following kink meme prompt:  
> http://personakinkmeme.dreamwidth.org/993.html?thread=161761#cmt161761


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